The Ruffin Court
summarized the analysis for unpaid meal breaks:
As long as the employee can pursue his or her mealtime adequately
and comfortably, is not engaged in the performance of any substantial duties,
and does not spend time predominantly for the employer’s
benefit, the employee is relieved of duty and is not entitled to compensation
under the FLSA.
Whether time is spent predominantly for the employer’s or the
employee’s benefit depends on the totality of the circumstances. . . . It is the employee’s burden to prove
that a meal period is compensable.
. . . Although
“substantial duties need not be more than waiting for something to happen, or ‘[r]eadiness
to serve[,]’”“‘[i]t is only when an employee is required to give up a
substantial measure of his time and effort that compensable working time is
involved.’”
. . . .
A second factor to consider is whether the employer’s
business regularly interrupts the employee’s meal period. The frequency of such
interruptions is important because “[t]he question is not whether [the
employees’] meals were interrupted . . . but whether the degree of interruption
caused them to spend their meal periods primarily for [the employer’s]
benefit.” . . . It is thus possible that an employee
who does not perform a substantial duty during the meal break, but who must consistently
interrupt the meal to perform one task or another, nevertheless spends that
time predominantly for the employer’s benefit.
. . .
A final factor we consider is the employee’s inability to
leave the employer’s property during meal breaks.
. . . [The FLSA] regulations
says that “[i]t is not necessary that an employee be permitted to leave the
premises if he is otherwise completely freed from duties during the meal
period.” 29 C.F.R. § 785.19(b).
. . . .
. . . The relevant inquiry should therefore be
whether the employer requires an employee to take meals on the premises as an
indirect or round-about way of extracting unpaid work from the employee.
In Ruffin, the
issue was the alleged non-payment of 1.25 hours/week FLSA overtime compensation
if the meal breaks were considered to be compensable hours worked. (The guards were also mandated to attend a 15
minute roll call meeting every day for which they had not been properly paid). The plaintiff guards were covered by a
collective bargaining agreement which provided for paid meal breaks. If a guard’s
meal break were interrupted by an emergency call (which were “essentially
unheard of”), they were entitled to make up the break. No grievances were ever filed alleging a
failure to make up a break. The plaintiffs
complained about having to monitor their radios, but admitted that they were
able to read, make and receive telephone calls, surf the internet and otherwise
socialize during their meal breaks. Because the meal breaks did not constitute
compensable hours worked under the FLSA, the court used those 30 minutes of
paid time to offset the 15 minutes of improperly uncompensated roll-call
meeting time and found that the employees had only worked 38.75 hours per week
for FLSA overtime purposes. “Numerous courts . . . have declined to find that
an employer’s requirement that an employee carry a radio and respond if
necessary converts the meal time to work time.”
In Yellow Enterprises,
the EMTs contended that they sometimes reported working through their unpaid
meal break, but occasionally were not paid for that time. However, they also admitted that they could
not prove it with examples of specific instances (and bore the burden of
proof). The employer’s policy had the
following wrinkles:
·
During the plaintiffs’ employment, [the
employer] automatically designated a 30-minute slot during each 8.5-hour shift
as an unpaid lunch break. EMTs in the field were not allotted a specific time
period for lunch but were instructed to take advantage of down time between ambulance runs to eat a meal. This
30-minute meal break could occur at any point during an employee’s 8.5-hour
shift.
·
[The employer’s] policy required
employees to radio the dispatch to request permission to take a lunch break.
Occasional requests for lunch breaks would be denied if call volume was too
high. . . . [C]rews would not be paid
for lunch if they had the opportunity to obtain a lunch but chose not to do so.
The plaintiffs attempted to show that the employer knew that
they had worked through some unpaid meal periods because the dispatchers were
required to note when employees reported off for lunch. However, the dispatchers were not reliable in
completing this task and the employer relied exclusively on employees reporting
missed lunch breaks to their supervisor, Administrator or dispatch
officer. The plaintiffs admitted that
they did not always notify anyone about missed meal breaks and could not show
that any employees had ever been disciplined or threatened with discipline for reporting
a missed meal break.
The Court
noted that “if an employer establishes a reasonable process for an
employee to report uncompensated work time the employer is not liable for
non-payment if the employee fails to follow the established process.”
Here, the plaintiffs have not produced
evidence that [the employer] had either constructive or actual knowledge that they were not receiving
compensation for missed meal breaks. . . . . Although the plaintiffs argue that their
managers had actual knowledge that the plaintiffs were regularly missing meal
breaks and were not submitting missed-lunch slips, the plaintiffs’ counsel conceded
at oral argument that there was no evidence in the record that the managers
were regularly reviewing the crew logs at any time other than when a
missed-lunch slip was submitted. . . . Moreover, given that the plaintiffs have
testified that on several occasions they did use the missed-lunch slip
procedure and were reimbursed for their missed lunches, we cannot say that it
was unreasonable for [the employer] not to cross-check the crew logs with the
missed-lunch slips to ensure that the plaintiffs were paid for all missed
lunches.
The EMTs also argued that their meal breaks predominantly
benefitted the employer due to certain restrictions (such as monitoring their
radios, remaining within a mile of their assigned territory and responding to
emergency calls), but the Court rejected those restrictions as minimal (as
already discussed above).
NOTICE: This summary is designed merely to inform and
alert you of recent legal developments. It does not constitute legal advice and
does not apply to any particular situation because different facts could lead
to different results. Information here can change or be amended without notice.
Readers should not act upon this information without legal advice. If you have
any questions about anything you have read, you should consult with or retain
an employment attorney.
